The Misdiagnosis of Abortion

One of the inherent problems with the abortion argument is that we too often center on the procedure itself. While I certainly agree any procedure where a fetus/baby is murdered and extracted is the definition of horrific, and certainly should be outlawed. But we have a bigger problem which we need to come to terms with as a society: When a woman becomes pregnant out of wedlock (or outside of a committed relationship, if you prefer the secular term), how do we treat her, and her baby?

Go back to 1973, before Roe vs. Wade. When a woman got pregnant out of wedlock/committed relationship, here were her options:

1. Have the baby and give it up for adoption. A fair choice, which usually involved going into hiding for several months, so nobody would figure out you were pregnant. If they found out anyway, and you were from the middle or wealthy classes, you could get a bit of shaming for it. In earlier times, the shaming was MUCH worse. 

2. Have the baby and raise it. Anything short of the father/husband died was a reputation sentence for both the mother and child in earlier times. By the 70's, the shaming was wearing down a lot, but there were still plenty of communities where both mother and child got shamed for out of wedlock marriages. 

3. Abortion. Prior to legalized abortion, this carried it's own risks for the mother. She could be killed, or even be sterilized. After legalized abortion, it's mostly safe, but only for the mother.

So how did we lose the first two parts of this discussion?

Obviously, the third part, abortion, got elevated beyond it's need. Discussions of abortion got blown out of perspective by discussions dominated by the exceptions, "cases of rape or incest". The argument goes: How dare we force a raped woman (or girl) to have a baby they never wanted?! The flaw in this thinking is the baby, who might ask, "How dare you kill me when I never asked to be conceived?!" How convenient it is to overlook the child who can't speak for itself.

The one possible exception I can think of is when the mother has a life-threatening medical condition that prevents her from going full-term with a baby. If it is a case of the mother or the baby, and there is absolutely no chance of saving both of them, then abortion is a reasonable, albeit regrettable, procedure. But that is the kind of choice where you kill one person to save another.

Adoption has always been an option when a woman has an unwanted baby. Why do we only reserve that option for the "already born"? Because it is inconvenient to carry a baby for 9 months. Even with a child who is the result of rape or incest, what is your reasoning? The mother should not be bothered with a child she never wanted? Too bad for you baby, mommy never planned you, so you get the death penalty? That doesn't seem fair, does it?

What about viability? Ask yourself this question: Do you believe that 1000 years from now, it might be possible that a child could be viable from the moment of conception? Scientific advances could make it possible to take a fetus from  the womb and literally incubate it to full term. This is POSSIBLE. And if it is possible, then aren't we terribly barbaric to kill these fetuses before birth? I say, yes, we are barbaric. Mind you, I am not some religious fanatic who is taking this on some faith in a scripture. This is only the potential of science I am considering.

Once you take the abortion question out of consideration for what to do with an unborn fetus, and I believe that is necessary for future generations, then we only have the first two parts of the question remaining: Put up the baby for adoption or raise it. And these are social questions. But why do we need to stigmatize them? Why can't a woman choose either of these options without being treated as an outcast?

I can appreciate that people don't want a baby raised out of wedlock/"committed relationship" because children with those backgrounds tend to do worse in life, with higher crime rates, for example. But there are also children with those backgrounds who do well in life (For example, Bill Clinton's father died before he was born). Giving them the death penalty before they even have a chance at life is a cynicism beyond anything I am capable, and I am pretty cynical.

At some point, we will need to look at what to do with babies, and look at how we treat the mother, and not strictly view it through an "abortion or not" lens. If we treat the mother and/or her baby as an aberration, then how can we justify the value of life? At some point, we need to tell the mother that we value both her and her child. Without that, we as a society can go ahead and kill that child, because that is the message the mother gets from us.